DiscoveRx is pleased to announce the successful completion of a collaborative effort with the NIH Chemical Genomics Center designed to validate the PathHunter assay technology for discovery-based screening efforts. PathHunter is an antibody and imaging free cell-based screening technology that provides detailed information on protein activities in cell signaling pathways using a unique positional complementation assay format designed for HTS applications. The data from the collaboration is publicly available within the PubChem database under Assay ID #451.

"The collaboration was established to validate the utility of PathHunter in an HTS setting, demonstrate the ability to successfully implement the assay with low cell numbers in 1536-well microplates, and provide comparative information for a particular Nuclear Hormone Receptor target in both a PathHunter format and a second imaging-based approach," stated Dr. Keith R. Olson, Vice President of Product & Market Development. "The results were very satisfying for each of these objectives, and clearly establish that our technology will be applicable to other NIH researchers looking to develop cell-based assays amenable to the guidelines established under the Molecular Libraries Roadmap Initiative."

Since the collaboration was established, DiscoveRx has further extended its assay capabilities and expanded the PathHunter product line significantly. Most notable is the addition of a novel protein-protein interaction approach for generic analysis of GPCR signaling based on beta-arrestin recruitment to activated receptors. Expression vectors, biosensor cell lines, and detection reagents are also available for analysis of a range of other drug discovery targets, such as kinases and proteases, and a variety of applications, such as protein expression, degradation, secretion and intracellular translocation. Full details on the PathHunter technology and available products can be found on our website at the article webpage.